


On Borrowed Time

by ThisCatastrophe



Category: Naruto
Genre: Akatsuki OC, Co-Sleeping, Cooking, Domestic Fluff, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Pretending it's your house when it's really not, Rain
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-11
Updated: 2018-05-11
Packaged: 2019-05-05 13:11:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 992
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14619264
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThisCatastrophe/pseuds/ThisCatastrophe
Summary: Itachi and Akemi stop in the Land of Rivers for a meal and a good night's rest. Nevermind that it's not their house.





	On Borrowed Time

**Author's Note:**

> Hey y'all. This was commissioned by [curiouscarecrow](http://curiouscarecrow.tumblr.com/) over on tumblr. His Akemi is a good time to write; go say hi if you enjoyed our redhead friend.

There is a red-cedar house in the Land of Rivers. Its eaves crisscross in low ceilings, casting strange and faint shadows on its tatami floors, and in rainy weather little sprays of water blow in on eastward winds through the sliding doors, left open to chase out the smell of stale flowers and untouched living spaces.

Enclosed are the memories and belongings of a family not present, but the intruders pretend that the house is theirs.

Dark clouds chased them down the road leading southwest from the Land of Fire; Akemi hates that his partner couldn’t spend more time in the dense, sun-dappled forests, but he welcomes the humidity and the gentle sound, steadily working to a driving drum, of rain against the karahafu gables. Another breeze enters the house and he feels the pinpricks of water that come to rest on his arms.

From the attached kitchen comes the hiss of oil in a hot pan, thrumming rhythmically as it passes over and over the heated basin of a borrowed wok. Akemi notes the clink of metal on metal—the pan returned to its burner—and focuses on the gentle shuffle of fabric before rising from the cushion on the floor.

He leaves behind a thin, weathered paperback, folded open to crease the spine. Easier to hold it one-handed with the cover tucked ‘round back. In a past life, maybe his hands would be swatted like a child’s for the offense, but not today. He’s free to ruin things as he likes, to fold them over and dog-ear his life until it looks like something he can admire, rumpled and imperfect and his. 

There are more imperfections to be admired in the next room over. He stands still in the doorway and watches the kitchen.

Itachi had deposited his red-cloud cloak on the low table, an heirloom it seems, the only traditional piece in the out-of-place modern kitchen. He stands relaxed, or as relaxed as he can get, with one hand on the wraparound counter, flicking a thumb through the absent family’s recipe box, hair tied loosely in a bun that exposes the freshly-scrubbed, bath-warm skin of his neck.

Akemi swears there’s a shaft of light on him, the way he glows.

“Itachi,” he murmurs—the little noises are too precious to interrupt—and thankfully he’s heard. Just as his arms make their way around the for-once-exposed waist, Itachi’s shoulder turns into the space between his chin and shoulder, and an arm drapes along his back. 

“I’m making niratama donburi,” Itachi replies. “Is that alright?” Akemi’s arms tighten around his waist in response.

“It’s alright. Did you use the eggs we bought?”

There’s a sound to Itachi’s gentle smile, and he turns in Akemi’s grasp to indicate the four khaki-brown eggs in a shallow dish beside the stovetop. “I will. And I’m leaving ten ryo on the table for the family.”

“Hm,” Akemi replies. “I’ll wash the dishes, then.”

A lock of damp red hair creeps its way onto Itachi’s shoulder as he cracks each of the eggs into the pan. Stray bathwater seeps into his skin; Itachi reaches across his chest to gently push the hair away, leaving his hand to trail across Akemi’s forearms on its way back.

“You’ve been quiet since we arrived,” Itachi begins. “Though you’re quiet for the most part.” He pauses for a long moment while he shuffles the wok on the stovetop, swirling the mixed egg in the pan as he adds chopped chives and crumbled nori.

“Is something wrong?”

Akemi watches the way the eggs puff up to cover the chives, how the edges pull away from the hot pan. “I’m just enjoying the moment. That’s all.” Outside, grey-feathered birds coo in the dry spaces under the porch overhang, ruffling their feathers in preparation for flight.

The same hand passes back across a tense shoulder to smooth Akemi’s hair. It idles at his temple, a thumb pressed to warm skin, before dropping to the wok’s handle. “Be honest,” Itachi says. “You can tell me.”

“You see right through me.” Akemi smiles gently and leans into the crook of Itachi’s neck, cheek tipping to the side to steal body heat. “I’m trying to make the moment mine. I want to remember it.” He pauses. “Even if things get rough down the road.”

The road. The thin grit and clinging dust that winds through the world’s great shinobi countries, from the doorstep of one jinchuriki to the next. The road that always leads back to a cold and remote hideaway rather than a childhood home. 

“You’ll remember.” Itachi shifts the wok to a back burner and reaches for the pot of rice, quietly steaming away under a wooden drop lid. “I trust you to remember. No concentration necessary.”

Something in Akemi wants to disagree: I’ll forget, the bad will outweigh the good, in the end all I’ll see is whatever painful end we come to, but Itachi’s warm hand settles over his and the smell of steamed rice fills the kitchen. “Sit down and I’ll fix you a bowl,” he hears, and he obeys.

They eat in a comfortable silence broken at the end with the gentle sigh of a tender kiss and the shuffle of bare feet on stone tile. Hands find each other, find loose, now-dry hair and pale cheeks, then find some stranger’s bedsheets tucked away in a closet. Itachi closes the partitions to the porch; Akemi pushes them open just enough to watch the rain and to smell the petrichor. 

In the still of night, Itachi presses his nose into Akemi’s hair and lets himself memorize the best parts; the hands, the touches, the dinner, without the stolen sheets and stranger’s dishes.

There is a red-cedar house in the Land of Rivers, dark and silent under a rain long awaited. Strangers sleep, chests pressed together, in the shade of another person’s home, willing it to be theirs for a borrowed moment.


End file.
